Titans May Take A Tumble

Depke, Welton Face Re-election Challenge

They're known as the "twin towers of power" in some Lake County political circles.

One man has been village president of Lake County's fastest-growing community for more than two decades, making him the dean of the far north suburban mayors.

The other has ruled over the Lake County Board for the past six years, while also serving as supervisor of Warren Township, a post he's held for 35 years.

Together, they've helped make Gurnee the centerpiece of Lake County, replete with a huge shopping mall and amusement park that have made the village one of Illinois' top tourist attractions.

But suddenly, the political careers of Gurnee Mayor Richard Welton and Warren Township Supervisor Robert W. Depke are being threatened.

"Depke and Welton are both old-time Gurnee families, and their political power base is in the older part of Gurnee, where everyone knew each other," said Suzanne Simpson, the Warren Township Republican Party chairwoman who has decided to challenge Depke's rule as township supervisor.

"But it's not like that anymore," said Simpson, 42, a resident of unincorporated Grayslake. "Warren Township's population has doubled in the past 10 years, and people's needs have changed and the people themselves have changed."

The signs of change in Lake County are everywhere: in the former farm fields tagged with sticks where houses will soon be built; on winding two-lane highways clogged with cars and pockmarked by potholes; and in the mobile classrooms set up to alleviate school crowding.

But perhaps the signs of change are most stark in Lake County's many housing subdivisions--the same ones Depke and Welton wooed to the area with their political empires.

Challenged by newcomers in some of those same subdivisions, Depke and Welton now find themselves fighting for their political lives like they've never had to fight before.

"The newest person will say to me, `I moved to this town because it was a nice community. Please don't wreck it,' " Welton said.

Before now, no one even thought to challenge Depke, 67, or Welton, 54, both lifelong Gurnee residents.

And before Welton and Depke, there were no recreation facilities, no library, no shops, no apartments and no full-time police officers or firefighters in Gurnee, all of which the two helped bring to town over the past 24 years.

But many residents of Gurnee and Warren Township don't remember Lake County that far back. Especially the residents who moved to the area in the past decade, thinking it would stay the same no matter how long they lived there.

And it is precisely the newer residents who make up the core group of voters who could sweep out one era of political power in Lake County and usher in something new in next spring's municipal and township elections.

Al Westerman, a Waukegan land preservationist, proved what was believed to be impossible in March when he defeated Depke in the Republican primary for the District 6 County Board seat Depke held.

Westerman took his shoestring-budget campaign to the subdivisions, where discontent with rapid growth, slow roads and crowded schools was rampant.

His victory, as it turned out, provided the impetus for others like him to try their luck at poking holes in Gurnee's political power base. "I created this chink in the armor, and now everyone is jumping on these guys."

Besides Simpson, Gurnee businessman Robert Kofler, who sits on the Warren Township High School Board of Trustees, also has announced his candidacy against Depke in April's elections.

One thing remains the same: Depke, always a man of few words, declined to comment on the challenge he faces.

Not so long ago just the idea of challenging Depke would have been unthinkable. But the newcomers don't know that.

"The new people don't know that Bob Depke used to live above the family's garage, and they don't care, either," said Lake County Board member Larry Leafblad (R-Grayslake). "They just see a guy who looks like he has too much, and they want to jerk it away."

F.T. "Mike" Graham, a former Lake County Board member from Gurnee, said he thinks it isn't just the newcomers who are presenting problems for the area's existing political power structure.

"It was the old-timers who beat Depke," Graham said. "It was the old-timers who were fed up with traffic, fed up with the high costs of schools and so on."

The old-timers, however, couldn't have done it without the help of Lake's newest residents.

"They were part of the problem five years ago, but now they're part of the solution," said Graham, who led an anti-growth group on the County Board in the 1980s that was replaced in the 1990s by Depke and his pro-growth style of politics.

Like Depke, Welton also has expected challengers, including trustee candidate Thomas Chamberlain, a Southridge subdivision resident and a critic of Welton's mostly rubber-stamp board.

It was Chamberlain who recently almost singlehandedly forced the mayor and other village officials to stop accepting the free passes they had been receiving from Six Flags Great America--and handing out to others--for the past 20 years.

Welton said he understands the complaints of new residents.

"It's human nature," Welton said of the criticisms. "But I've spent my whole life trying to build this town."

And Welton said he hopes that rather than just complain, new residents get involved in building the town too.